Seas Too Far To Reach
by Random-Battlecry
Summary: She doesn't take any more kindly to fate after her adventures in Underland than before. If anyone's going to arrange her affairs, it will be Alice herself. After all, she doesn't want the figments; only the reality. Alice/Hatter.
1. Chapter 1

**Fandom: Burton's _Alice In Wonderland_, with numerous nods to the original books**  
**Characters/Pairing: Alice/Hatter, the White Queen, the March Hare, the Dormouse**  
**Genre: romance/drama**  
**Disclaimer: I don't own them. But they totally own me.**  
**Summary: She doesn't take any more kindly to fate after her adventures in Underland than before. If anyone's going to arrange her affairs, it will be Alice herself. After all, she doesn't want the figments; only the reality.**  
**A/N: Mostly, I think, this comes from all the posts I read about people wanting there to be a Hatter equivalent on the ship at the end or, at least, Jack Sparrow. Because I don't think Alice would take very kindly to an "equivalent."**

* * *

**Seas Too Far To Reach**

with your body next to me, its sleepy sighing  
sounds like waves upon a sea too far to reach  
but I'll gather up my men and try to sail on it again  
and we'll walk and quietly talk all through the country of your skin  
made up of pieces of the places that you've dreamed  
and that you've been

-Okkervil River, _Seas Too Far To Reach_

* * *

It didn't occur to Alice that she might possibly be the type to succumb to sea-sickness until after the _Wonder_ was pulling away from its berth. By then, of course, the sudden suspicion could not do her much good. Certainly she _could_ go to Captain MacManus and ask him to turn back; but then she would never find out for certain. And that would never do. No, far better to stay in her place and wait.

The edge of water, brown from the offal and effluent of the docks and ships forever coming and going, stretched farther, ever-widening. She had done her duty in waving goodbye, and thus the last of her familial obligations were discharged for the time being; the time being in question incorporating a span of some six months. She felt giddy at the thought of it. Alone at last! Well, she amended, sweeping a glance around the crowded deck, perhaps not _alone_. But certainly more alone than she had ever been.

Apart from the recent stretch in the Underland; but the lure of the memory, the calling to stand still and slip into a reverie, was falsely seductive. She hadn't the time for it, and shook it off, though not without effort.

Instead, there was the settling-in to be done, if she wished. She had a cabin all her own, of course, and into it her trunk had been deposited. For a moment she wavered on deck, torn between going below and sorting out her belongings and staying above and testing out the effect of the open waters on her stomach. She actually took three and a quarter steps towards the hatchway before turning about again and casting a longing glance out past the railing, into the wild, wide open depths stretching to the curving edge of the world.

"Is there a problem, Miss Kingsleigh?"

Captain MacManus appeared at her elbow, face muddled into a concerned expression. He had a curious set of features that lent him the aspect of a thoughtful bloodhound, mournful and long-nosed and unusually jowly. He reminded her strongly of Bayard, as a matter of fact, but she couldn't think about that now. Not when he had questioned her so kindly, and was reaching for her arm.

"I'm fine," she said. "Just a bit indecisive, that's all. Never mind." She tucked her arm close to her side to thwart this overture; Captain MacManus was kindly enough, but Alice did not feel like being kindly'd at. Not in that way. Not when she could still feel the warmth of other hands, ghostlike and months-gone, tucked in hers.

But now was not the time to think of that, either.

Captain MacManus retrieved his hand to tuck it with the other in his pockets. "Now, Miss Kingsleigh, there's no room for indecisiveness on this deck. I run a tight ship, as you'll soon find out. What is it that's troubling you?"

"I am waiting," she replied, "to see whether I'll get sea sick or not. I'm certainly hoping for the latter, but only time will tell."

Captain MacManus gave a shake of his heavy head. "You're a strange one, Miss Kingsleigh. Ah well--- I can't say I wasn't warned." He lightened this statement with a jovial chuckle; Alice went on staring at him, now in some consternation. He'd been _warned_? Who on earth would have thought to do such a thing? Someone who knew her a bit too well, perhaps, and it wasn't as though she could rightly contest it; she _was_ a strange one, comparatively speaking. But it concerned her all the same.

"When you say that you were warned---" she began.

But Captain MacManus had moved on, with the effortlessness displayed by those who do not, habitually, pause for too deep a think about anything. "Supposing you take a turn about the ship and familiarize yourself with everything, eh? Carter there can help you." He signaled with a brief lift of his hand to a young sailor across the deck from them. The young man was at their side with alacrity, hands clasped behind his back; he gave a nod to Alice and a salute to his Captain, who began to give him instructions for the care and keeping of strange young women one must conduct about the ship. Alice lost interest very quickly, half-turning away from the two to stare again out at the ocean. The land was by now only a strip of darkness, nothing but a demarcation separating the horizon from the sea; and soon would slip away to be nothing at all.

Alice realized that she was walking on wood, on water; and this struck her as very curious indeed.

Captain MacManus finished up his instructional soliloquy with, "And make certain she doesn't take a tumble overboard. We don't want her washing up on some deserted island, now, do we?" The smile with which he accompanied this seemed to Alice a particularly lugubrious one, as though he was already contemplating the reaction he would receive, should he be forced to have to convey the news about Alice's unpleasant demise to her mother; but Alice herself did not see the point in dwelling on the depressing. On the contrary, she could readily picture herself strolling about barefoot and half naked on the sand of some impossible island, never before touched or even seen by a human.

"With me, Miss Kingsleigh?" the sailor named Carter was saying, and with an effort she pulled herself back from the sandy beaches and followed her leader down the deck.

"My imagination has certainly become more vivid since my visit to Wonderland," she mused to herself as she followed the boy; and a burr of a voice, thickened with a momentary heaviness and the speaker's unsure grasp of reality, breathed in her ear, "_Most definitely_." But when she turned her head, so swiftly as to nearly lose her balance, there was no one there. Only Carter, trying to impress on her the importance of a set of heavily knotted ropes as they related to the sails being let up and down.

Alice felt quite out of sorts, after that. At last, she said, "I do believe I'm seasick after all, Mr. Carter. Perhaps I'll go to my cabin."

"As you wish, of course," said the young man, looking somewhat relieved. "There is no better place to be ill than in one's cabin. That is to say--- I do hope you benefit by it. The cabin, that is. Not the sickness."

She nodded to him, uninclined to pay him much more attention than that, and went on her way.

The voice did not reoccur. And Absolem, if it _was_ he, was nowhere to be seen. Alice buried her disappointment beneath layers of dreaming, seating herself by the porthole in her cabin and watching as the acres of water outside went by, none quite the same as another, but all, somehow, just alike. No, she was not seasick after all. But even this discovery of a personal strength could not rouse her from her preoccupation.

The trouble, as far as she could explain it to herself, was in dwelling too much on the past and not enough on the present. Here she was on a ship, bound for the darkened areas on a map that showed only as Beyond, having left behind family and friends and prospects of marriage and settling down. And could she live in the moment, could she focus her mind on the adventure that was going on here and now? She could not.

"It's certainly a failing, Alice," she told herself sternly. "And one you must work hard to correct. What would the Hatter say if he saw you moping like this?"

She considered this; it was not an unpleasant thought. At length she arrived at a conclusion.

"He'd say you needed some tea," she informed herself decidedly, and left the cabin immediately to try and find her way to the kitchens.

* * *

It was on account of not paying the proper attention to her introductory tour round the ship that she became lost almost immediately. For a good ten minutes, Alice wandered about with her hands clasped behind her, occasionally knocking on doors and being reminded constantly of the room in which she had first landed, in Underland. Surrounded by locked doors, and keys either nonexistent, out of reach, or far too small. It was frustrating, especially to a young woman determined to make her own way in the world, that she could not even locate a source of tea.

She found that she was rapidly adapting her step to admit for the sway of the sea-borne ship, to adjust for each sideways toss or slip to the left, one hand reaching out to ghost along the passageways, should she need the added support. At any rate, getting one's sea legs was a sight more easy than traipsing across a moat, leaping from bobbing head to bobbing head; but that was a memory more easily dismissed than many, for she had no wish to dwell on it. A quick shake of her head and she was free of it. For the moment, at least; though it had a way of surprising her in the midst of her dreams which she did not like.

Now was not the time to think of that. Now was the time to find some tea.

She turned a doorknob and found herself out of the interior of the ship, on deck once again, in the wan sun and the ghosting mist and the pitching spray. For a moment she stood, fingers still curled around the knob, eyes drifting closed, and her head worlds away at the feel of the wind.

_Dusty sunlight, and a ruined windmill, and a table stretching before her laid with tea things and welcome companions with secretive smiles._

"Miss Kingsleigh?"

The voice interrupting her thoughts was vaguely familiar, and when she opened her eyes she found that it belonged to the young sailor whose duty it had been to conduct her about the ship earlier in the morning. She could not quite grant him a smile, but she did lift her chin a little, and give him her full attention, aware that he looked worried.

"Are you alright, Miss Kingsleigh?"

"I'm fine," she declared easily, without pausing to consider whether this was the truth or not. "I was looking for the kitchens, to have tea, and got lost. I don't suppose you could point me in the right direction."

The relief on his face was curious; she could not fathom the cause of it. But his smile was kindly, and immediate, and real; and he offered her his arm as he spoke. "I'll do you one better, Miss. Allow me to conduct you to the Captain's dining room. You can take tea there to your heart's content. Soothes the nerves, doesn't it, tea? Puts me in mind of my mum's hearth, growing up. I was always getting in some scrape or other as a lad, and tea was the remedy which cured all ills, up to and including mumps, and a broken heart. O'course, it was my facility with scrapes which caused my father to encourage me to take to the sea; so perhaps I can thank my broken bones and cracked head for the life I lead now."

Alice had given his arm a considered stare during this monologue before taking it; she now cast a glance up at him as he led her back into the corridor. "Do you really have a cracked head?"

"Cracked as an egg," said Carter cheerfully. "But don't you worry, Miss Kingsleigh. I'm not as mad as I seem. Not quite."

"You certainly are more talkative now than you were earlier," she pointed out. He took her along the hallway to the fourth door, and opened it for her, bowing her through before following in her wake.

"I fear you weren't paying attention to my lecture; for which I cannot blame you. It was tiresome, I'm sure; but, you see, if you had paid attention, you would have found the dining room on your own. And so I'm rather glad you didn't, for I wouldn't have had an excuse to accompany you." With this, he gave another smile, and a short bow. His long hair, tucked back smoothly and caught in a ribbon, was of dark auburn, and the ends of it flopped over his shoulder as he stood straight once more.

Alice seated herself at the empty table. The light in the dining room was wintry and pale, and made her feel strangely melancholy. The tea table was not nearly long enough, she thought.

She looked up again to the young man.

"Did Captain MacManus ask you to look out for me? Is that why you were so concerned?"

He had the grace to blush.

"He did indeed. But you know, Miss Kingsleigh, perhaps I would have been concerned regardless. It happens, you know."

She folded her hands before her on the table, straightening her back. "What happens?"

"Young men are concerned over the welfare of pretty young ladies," said Carter, abashedly, and gave another quick bow, backing out of the room. "I'll call for tea. Don't stir yourself."

He was gone, and the door closed behind him. Alice said aloud to the empty room, "But may I stir the tea?"

The empty room said nothing back; which was only to be expected. She was left, nonetheless, with a strangely dissatisfied feeling, and wished she had someone to talk to. The young sailor was eager and entertaining enough, she supposed, but there was something lacking in him. He looked too much like a simulacrum and not enough like a reality. It was the reddish hair, the pale skin, the recurring smile, the cracked head. The likeness of him carved a pit in her stomach, a void across which there was no bridge. She leaned her elbow on the table, her chin in her hand, and looked out the window with a faint frown.

Was everything in her world designed to remind her of another? That way, she was sure, lay madness. Was that not the driving force behind insanity, after all? A desire for things that no one else believes in, realities as solid as a the table before her, that could manifest themselves only as dreams, as figments of the imagination? And yet she believed in them still.

Alice reflected that her close acquaintance with the terms on which madness manifested itself could not help but be worrying to her family. Perhaps _that_ was why Captain MacManus had been warned. It was more than turning down an advantageous marriage; it was more than the unexpected futterwacken in the middle of a crowded garden party. It was something in the blood, something she'd shown for years, ever since she was a child. Alice Kingsleigh was a _strange girl_, and there was no getting around it.

Her thoughts had taken a morbid turn; she sat sunk in a daze, curling in on herself. "I don't suppose tea can cure this," she muttered to herself; and something, someone, came out of hiding to answer.

"Nonsense, my dear," came the lisp, "tea helps all _manner_ of ills. And if what can't be cured must be endured, then _at the very least_ it will give you the strength. I _know_ it."

She turned her head very slowly, so as to catch the speaker from the corner of her eye, if he should indeed be there at all. But the room was as empty as it had been when she first entered; more so, for she'd lost the desire to carry on a conversation with herself.

The tea, when it arrived, was a welcome diversion indeed. She sat alone at the table and poured it for herself, her mind drifting back to a time--- so very long ago--- when she had stumbled upon her very first tea party, and been simultaneously ridiculed and welcomed, stared at and sworn at and storied at, been given tea and denied cake and sat at the head of the table for one brief and dizzying moment, looking down the stretch of used tea-things and asking questions for which there were no answers. _What happens when you get to the beginning again?_

She shook herself, told herself firmly that this was not the time to think of such things. But her memories would not be denied; and what better time could there be, besides? She was alone with the tea service and the seas outside.

Helplessly, she gave herself up to a reverie, in which the reality of the present had no place.


	2. Chapter 2

**Part Two**

Carter was waiting when she emerged eventually back onto the deck; he greeted her with a smile, and she noted the slight crookedness of his teeth, which struck her as curiously endearing.

"I'm to point you back in the direction of your quarters, should you need a helping hand."

"Thank you," she said, "but I know my way now."

He bowed, and she nodded and went on her way; but as she went, could not help but cast a glance over her shoulder to where he cut a fine figure, back to her, looking out on the tossing surface of the sea.

* * *

It was not till the third day at sea that Alice got round to unpacking her things. She had not much of a nesting instinct, feeling quite content to retrieve her clothes from the trunk when they were needed; but Captain MacManus made endless inquiries as to how she was getting on, and she felt that if she put him off once more he would come down to settle her in himself. Or, which was perhaps worse, send Carter to do the job for her.

It was Carter she was thinking of, in a curious sort of indifferent attitude--- his hands among the folds of her dresses, brown from the sun and neat and trim, nevertheless shaking the dresses out sloppily and placing them haphazardly about the cabin, for he was of the sort who never knew the proper place of anything, she was sure--- when she came upon the hat. It was a very familiar hat, and it was most definitely not hers. Far too large, for one thing; and the charred and crisped edges were certainly not in the current mode of fashion. Not that Alice cared for such things; she stared at the article of haberdashery for a moment before a wondering sort of smile broke over her face like waves on a shore, and she reached for it with careful fingers. It was halfway to her head before she realized it, and settled neatly over her blonde curls before the voice interrupted.

"Oh, _there_ it is! I've been looking for it absolutely _every_where."

This time, he did not disappear when she looked for him. Merely stood there as though he'd been born in her cabin, one hand at his belt, the other dangling loose, waiting to reach for her. He looked mildly pleased when she turned the smile on him.

"Hatter."

"Alice," he chided, "it really doesn't suit you, you know."

She hadn't smiled this hard and bright in ages.

"Then take it back," she said, lifting her chin and presenting her head to him well within his reach. "It _was_ you I heard, then. I thought I was---"

"Going mad?" He lifted the hat from her head, and dusted it off with his sleeve, directing the same affectionate smile towards it that he so often had given to Alice herself. "I shouldn't be in a hurry to discount that possibility, Alice."

She laughed. "But you are here. You're real, and you're here. In my cabin."

"I'm here, and I'm _not_ real, in, as you say, your cabin." It was her turn to be the recipient of the fond smile, and it made her straighten up and square her shoulders with the happiness of it.

"What do you mean?"

"_Here_," said the Hatter, ticking the points off on his bandaged fingers, "_not real_, and _in your cabin_."

"But you _are_ real. I can see you, I can hear you, I can---"

"Not real," he said cheerfully as her hand passed through him without the slightest bit of resistance. "I'm sorry to say that I really _am_ a figment of your imagination this time, Alice. Really. But not to worry! I've come to terms with it.

"But---" Her face fell, and he stepped forward, eyes softening and eyebrows drawing downwards.

"Alice, dearest Alice," he murmured, and with one hand traced a line down her cheek. She fancied she could feel the slightest brush of something; of what, precisely, she could not say. "Did you think I would leave you to your own devices, when I knew you would only forget again if I didn't do something?"

"I told you, I wouldn't. I _couldn't_. Hatter, why---"

"---is a raven like a writing desk?" he finished for her, and she smiled again.

"That's not quite what I was going to say. But I suppose it will do. I am so pleased to see you again, you know."

With both hands he settled the hat back in its rightful place, tipping it slightly to a rakish angle; then spread both arms wide, as though to embrace her.

"Exactly the right size, too," he murmured. "Perhaps after all you're a figment of _my_ imagination, Alice--- did you ever think of that? Perhaps I made you up myself." He nodded sharply. "And a fine job, too, if I do say so myself. Ex_treme_ly lifelike."

"Hatter---" she began again, but there came a knock at the door; she turned to it, quickly, and just as quickly turned back again. But he was nowhere to be seen; had disappeared into the air as swiftly and completely as a dream. And though she searched, and called quietly, he did not reappear.

It was not Carter, nor Captain MacManus, but another sailor who was at her door, and bid her to come to dinner. Alice went, though in a mood which was hardly gruntled; her fixed glare at the soup course led Captain MacManus to inquire after her health.

She pled the excuse of a headache, which facilitated her escape from the table soon after the pudding was served. In a whirl she made her way back towards her cabin, only to be arrested on the very threshold by a voice from farther down the dimly lit corridor.

"Are you quite alright?"

It startled her, and she turned to the speaker with confusion clear on her face. It was only Carter, of course; had he spoken with that faint Scottish burr, before? Surely she would have noticed. In the darkness of the corridor his clearly-limned features swam palely towards her, his brows drawn downwards and a worried crease showing above his eyes.

"I am fine, Mr. Carter. No need to worry." Her hand sought the doorknob, and he came closer.

"You look in an awful hurry, Miss Kingsleigh."

"I'm tired. That's all. Don't concern yourself."

"But," he said, and took one more step forward. He hovered just over her, now, and something in the curve of his lips, the heaviness of his gaze, struck her painfully about the middle. She had the oddest sensation that any moment now he was going to pose her a riddle; _why is a raven_, he would begin, and go on from there. Her breath caught in her throat, and she twisted at the doorknob, hand slipping briefly, and pushed open the door.

"Good night, Mr. Carter."

"Good night, Miss Kingsleigh," he said, sorrowfully, as she closed the door.

She leaned back against it for a moment, catching her breath, and wrapped an arm around her fluttering stomach. There seemed to be empty spaces there that had not existed a moment ago. She closed her eyes in the darkness of the room, gathering herself before she reached for the candle. It took her a moment to get it to light, and then she replaced it by her bunk and sank onto the smooth surface of her coverlet, sighing.

The moon outside was a brilliant slice of light, curved upwards like an eager, toothy smile; it was only because the light drew her attention that she realized there was something outside the porthole. Something with wings, fluttering and dashing against the glass, asking to be let in. The silver light of the moon leached the color from Absolem's wings, but she knew him all the same. The latch on the porthole was stuck, and she bruised and reddened her fingertips trying to get it undone. It opened in a rush at last, and the butterfly that was Absolem's new form drifted lazily in, as though he had all the time in the world.

The cold air, sea-scented and salted, banished the flush from Alice's cheek, and she leaned her head into the wind for a moment, reveling in the feeling. She could just get her head out of the porthole without becoming stuck, but no further. Instead of a door for which she was too large, it was the porthole; instead of a garden waiting on the other side, there was the surging sea, brilliant beneath the grinning moon.

She withdrew her head with a sigh, and seated herself again on the now-rumpled bedclothes. Absolem had settled himself on her bedside table, well away from the dripping candle. He beat his wings slowly, steadily, as though basking in the warmth of an unseen sun.

"Will you tell me what's going on?" she demanded of him plaintively.

The voice that came from him was lighter than she remembered, almost tinny. But the words were familiar, all the same.

"What do you mean, girl? What do you _think_ is going on?"

"I think," she began, but so slowly that she gave Absolem plenty of time to give a genteel snort and say,

"Not likely."

Alice frowned at him. "I'm confused. At first I thought this was the beginning of a new life for myself. I thought I would move on. And yet, I'm still surrounded by memories of Wonderland."

"Underland," corrected Absolem, with a lazy sort of deliberation that seemed calculated to offend. This did not relieve Alice's frown.

"You, and the Hatter, and now even Mr. Carter seems to be---" She faltered and came to a halt. How to define what it was that Mr. Carter seemed to be doing? Certainly he could not be blamed for reminding her of the Hatter.

Who, then, could she blame?

"Are you doing something to him?" she demanded. "Are you making him this--- this way?"

"What way?" Absolem asked, obviously irritated.

"He reminds me more and more of the Hatter, as though he's meant to be a--- a replacement, or something of the sort." She waved her hands about. "But he's not. He isn't the Hatter, and no amount of similarities will convince me otherwise. What do you think you're doing, playing about with my mind this way?"

"I'm not doing anything, stupid girl," yawned Absolem, and beat his wings a little harder to lift himself into the air. "Would you be so upset if you believed that it really was all in your mind; that Tarrant and I were indeed figments of your imagination?"

"It's because I know that you're real that it upsets me so," she told him. "If I was truly mad, or if I was only imagining things---"

The butterfly disappeared, skated out of existence as cleanly as though she had woken up from a daydream. Only the voice of Absolem remained, drifting behind.

"Who's to say you're _not_, stupid girl?"

And as he was gone, of course, she could not argue.

* * *

She went out of her way to avoid Carter the next few days, keeping largely to herself and holding her own counsel. When she did catch a glimpse of him, here and there, he was always looking in her direction; always rewarded her gaze with a faint smile, as though just by her presence he was reassured as to the rightness of the world. It incensed her beyond reason, and she retreated to her cabin after each occurrence with an increasing sensation of futility. For her cabin would be empty, each time she entered, and though she looked for the hat, waiting in the corner, and listened for the voice, purring in her ear, there was nothing. Her search was in vain.

Having been at sea a week, she was stormily contemplating the placid rise and fall of the ocean before her, hands on the railing and heart ill at ease, when the voice came once more. It sounded not in her ear, but somewhere just behind her, so that as her heart began to race she became settled in the belief that the Hatter would be there, waiting, when she turned around.

"Can I offer you some tea?"

She kept her eyes on the sea, as though it was the only thing that would sustain her when she fell.

"Not just at present," she said. "I do thank you."

"You do. That's a relief, I must say." And he did sound relieved. "I was beginning to think you were angry with me."

She felt a tremendous release, and even went so far as to smile to the implacable face of the waters. "Nonsense. You're the last person I should be angry with."

"Ah, good. You don't know how pleased I am to hear that, Miss Kingsleigh."

It was this, of course, that made her realize who she was talking to after all. It was not the Hatter, for he had never called her anything but Alice, unless it was "my dearest Alice." The sense of disappointment that crashed down onto her made her feel lost, adrift, as lonely as though she were marooned on a desert island.

She turned slowly, and the sight of Carter's eager face, so familiar and yet so different, so not what she wanted, was almost more than she could bear.

"Excuse me," she said, and though he stepped towards her, she evaded him easily and ran with quick light steps to her cabin.

The disappointment had altered, shifted to something else; something darker and more powerful, tinged with the blue edges of a deep sadness. She slammed her door so hard that it rattled on its hinges, and demanded an account from the air.

"I know you're there," she cried. "You always have been, ever since I set foot back in my own world. I don't know how, and I haven't a clue why, but I know that you are. Stop hiding from me, and tell me why this is happening."

But it wasn't the Hatter who stepped out of hiding, but rather the White Queen, cool and shining, hands lifted in the air as though she were about to perform a magic trick. Take Alice's frustration and anger and turn it inside out, spin it into something more becoming to the once-champion of Wonderland. _Underland_, a tiny voice in Alice's head corrected her immediately. _Wonderland that was, Underland that is. There is a difference. Learn it._

Alice stood with her hands at her sides, still breathing hard, her anger turning slowly to confusion.

"Queen Mirana."

"Alice," said the White Queen, somewhat distantly, and gave a vague if kindly smile that seemed to pat Alice on the head. "Why so upset, my dear child?"

"Because I don't understand what's going on," Alice said, somewhat petulantly. Mirana always did have that effect on her, after all, making her feel as though she were a child again. Taking the years she'd spent actively trying to grow up and making them nothing but a thought in the mind of a dreamer. "I can't seem to move on, and I thought that's what I was meant to do. When I left, I told the Hatter I had things to take care of."

Mirana inclined her head. "As, indeed, you do."

"But I can't go and take care of them if I can't let go of Underland!"

Mirana lifted a hand to her forehead, closing her eyes briefly, as though Alice had tired her. "I understand that, of course, my dear child. Which is why I'm trying to help you. You do see, don't you, that I'm trying to help?"

Alice subsided onto her bed, staring in consternation at the White Queen. "Help me?" she repeated. "How are you _helping_ me?"

The look that showed itself briefly on Mirana's face seemed to indicate that Alice was really _hopelessly_ thick at times. She shoved it aside almost immediately, replacing it with her usual expression of placidness and peace, and sank down gracefully beside Alice on the bunk.

"Dear girl," she said, "you must move on. But it is easier to do so when one finds familiar elements in new surroundings."

Alice could not look in the Queen's face for long; she transferred her gaze instead to her own hands, settled in her lap. How small and brown they looked, next to the Queen's long, pale fingers!

"That's why, then," she said. "I keep thinking I must be imagining it, the similarities between my life now and the way things were in Underland. But I'm not, am I? It's all real."

"It certainly is," said Mirana warmly, and she placed a hand on Alice's. "And so is the young man, my dear. You shall not be wanting for companionship."

Alice looked at her in dawning comprehension, and gradually rising anger. "Not be wanting? Is he truly meant to take the place of the Hatter, then?"

"Well, I couldn't very well spare the real one, could I?" said Mirana gently. "He is _quite_ busy in court. Otherwise I'm certain he would want to come and visit you more often than he does; he told me he was here just the other day, but his trip had to be curtailed, unfortunately. I'm sure he wouldn't want you to be unhappy, however."

Alice stood, and backed a step away. "Mr. Carter is to take his place? He _can't_ be in agreement with that. He doesn't want me to forget him. He doesn't want me to simply move on as though he doesn't exist."

Mirana stood, too, and reached a hand out to her. "Of course he wants you to remember him, Alice dear. We all do. But we want what's best for you, as well. And Tarrant knows, as we all know, that _this_ is your world. You belong here, not in Underland."

"How can you know that, when I haven't even decided myself? I want to come back, I do. And I will, when I get the chance."

"Indeed," said Mirana soothingly. "But in the meantime, dear Alice, you're lonely. We all know it. We all feel it. You cannot go on being content with illusions, my child."

"I'm not content," said Alice, still petulant. "I'm not."

The Queen's hands were in the air again, graceful as lilies, and her placid smile was strangely sweet. "I know, my dearest Alice. I know."

Alice closed her eyes for only a second, just to blink, and when she opened them, she was alone again. She had hardly expected anything else.


	3. Chapter 3

**Part Three**

She was still quite upset the next morning, and so although the Hatter appeared almost immediately, she was resolved to ignore him for at least a good half hour. Just so he learned his lesson.

He followed her at a distance as she moved about the deck, breathing deeply the fresh air, free from corsetry. There was no one to force her into what was viewed as "proper," no one to admonish her when she neglected to put on stockings. As a matter of fact, with care and precision she had managed to remove all stockings from her trunk while her mother's back was turned; she could go about barefoot on the ship, if she wished, and no one would say anything about it. The thought reminded her strongly of her fantasies of a desert island, and she lapsed back into them quite happily, till a cough to her left reminded her that she was not alone.

The Hatter had mimicked the posture she'd adopted, wrists on the rail, hands clasped, leaning forward. He was looking directly at her when she turned her gaze in his direction, and gave her a wide and hopeful smile. She turned her glance out to see again immediately, but could not keep an answering smile from creeping into existence. Just the slightest quirk of her lips, an inwards and upwards tuck of the side of her mouth; but he caught it immediately.

"There, I knew you were feeling better! Perhaps it's because I've caught you before breakfast. Are you still believing impossible things?"

"Indeed I am," she answered. "One of them being that you're here with me, again. Supposing the wind blows off your hat and it falls into the sea?"

He clapped a hand down on it at the suggestion, frowning slightly, and Alice's smile emerged in all its glory.

"I'm glad I believe in impossible things," she said. "But I'm gladder still that you're here, figment of my imagination or not."

"Which begs the question, my dear," he recounted precisely, "as to whether it is _you_ or _I_ who are the figment? Who _is_ the figment, I mean. Who are--- is--- _am I_? Are _you_? Who's to say?" He shook his head, sputtering to a stop. "Beg pardon. I became verbally entangled there for a moment."

"That, beyond all things, is not surprising," she chided him gently, but she took a step towards him along with the comment, and her nearness made up for the slight derision which she displayed for his odd habits of communication. He brightened up immediately, shifting position till the sleeve of his peacock-colored jacket just brushed her bare arm; although, of course, neither of them could feel a thing.

"What I mean to say," he went on, "is, are you the dreamer and I the dream, or is it the other way around? How do we know which of us is dreaming the other?"

"I don't think this is a dream at all," said Alice. "I've never had a dream that was quite this pleasant. I mean to say," she amended, blushing under his suddenly direct gaze, "what with the fresh air, and the pitch of the ship, which is most enjoyable---"

"And the company," said the Hatter knowingly.

"And the company," allowed Alice. There was a vague familiarity in the way in which he was looking at her, putting her in mind of a brief moment, long ago, in the castle of the Queen of Hearts. He had asked her then--- rhetorically, it must be assumed--- why she was always too small or too tall. Well, she was the right size now, the right and proper Alice size, head reaching to his chin; and when everything else seemed to fit, _of course_ one or the other or both of them would be mostly, if not completely, imaginary. The Hatter seemed to have forgotten this fact, however, and though one hand remained firmly holding his hat in place, the other now crept sideways, reaching for hers; and he had drifted closer, almost without realizing it; and she could not look away.

"I don't think I've ever—" whispered the Hatter.

"---seen you look so happy," said Mr. Carter, from behind them, and as Alice straightened up with a slight gasp, the Hatter disappeared. She slid her hand along the railing towards where he had so recently been standing, but there was nothing; and the slight warmth that she fancied she felt would of course be left by the sun.

"I was---" said Alice.

Carter took a step towards her, a slight smile appearing; the sort of smile he saved for Alice and only Alice, and gave away to no one else. She felt the weight of his regard like an anchor, dragging her down.

"You were what?" he questioned softly. Alice caught his gaze, and held it.

"Happy," she said, shortly, and moved away.

* * *

Alice's mother had always taught her to be as polite as possible, and though she found herself increasingly confused by her reactions to Mr. Carter's resemblance to the Hatter, she also felt that she was being unfair. Certainly, as she had mentioned to herself before, it was not his fault. He was only meaning to be friendly, of course; and if anyone was to blamed, perhaps it should be Captain MacManus, for assigning the unfortunate sailor to look after her.

Regardless, however, she attempted to avoid him as much as possible. The marked resemblance to a man left behind in another world caused her more pain than anything; the Hatter's appearances as the days went by were less and less frequent, more and more fleeting. He put it down, when she inquired as to the reason, to his share in rebuilding Underland. Things were going along well there, he assured her; there were only a _few_ pockets of resistance which had to be dealt with. And of course Mirana had seen to it that only the most humane methods were being used. But he looked tired, and there were new lines around his eyes and mouth; he responded to her questions without enthusiasm, and seemed most to want to sit with her and keep her company in silence.

She left things as they were, but as the days passed and China drew ever closer, she made up her mind to impress upon him why she was not best pleased with Underland's apparent plan of substituting new acquaintances for old. She equipped herself for her argument in the only way she knew how: calling to mind as many memories as she could, of both the first trip to Underland and the second. There were many, more from the most recent journey; but even those of her childhood, blessed by time with a fuzzy sort of rosy vagueness, had returned little by little in bits and pieces and dreams, till she could piece the visit together in some semblance of order.

Eventually, she felt that the time had come.

He did not appear quite so tired on this occasion; was seated next to her in the cabin, lounging back with one leg crossed over the other and his head leaning against the wall. She seated herself on the bed and arranged her dress neatly.

"Can you stay for a few moments?"

"Certainly, my dear." He sat up straight, and his eyes narrowed with the pleased look of a smiling cat. "I'm always happy to be in your company, as I'm certain you know by now. As long as you don't actively kick me out of your cabin, I'm happy to remain."

"Only," Alice went on, "I do have something I wish to speak to you about. It's perhaps not entirely pleasant."

"Things which are not entirely pleasant," said the Hatter, "are my speciality." His face dropped for a moment. "Sadly. It's not the best speciality to have, I must say, but it's better than not having one at all. Although I suppose you could say it's my secondary speciality, as the first would of course be hats, and there's nothing unpleasant about hats. Unless they're poorly-made, and even a poorly-made hat has its merits. I recall one that was made for a Lioness I once knew--- did I ever tell you about the Lioness? Her husband got himself in trouble with a Unicorn, and everyone stopped speaking to her. But I said---"

"Hatter," said Alice. It was the third time she'd said it since he began speaking (he had heard none of them), and came out almost as a shout. He subsided immediately, shook his head a bit.

"Sorry," he said. "What was it you wanted to say, my dear?"

She took a deep breath. "It's about Mr. Carter."

"That young sailor?" His face seemed to slip into a freeze, of a sudden, as though he was very keen not to let on what he was thinking. His eyes dropped, and he turned his attention to the bandages on his fingers. "Nice fellow, I'm told. Once you get to know him."

"He is perfectly nice," Alice was forced to agree. "But that's not why I wanted to talk about him. There's a problem, you see."

The Hatter looked up at her from under his rampant eyebrows.

"There's always a problem," he said, somewhat darkly.

"But in this case a very specific one," Alice went on. "It seems, from what Queen Mirana has told me, that he has been almost---" the word failed her for a moment before she grasped at it, "---_designed_ to be a companion to me."

The Hatter considered this statement for a moment, then nodded. "That is a very good way to put it. Not entirely accurate, of course, but an admirable effort all the same." He gave her a grain, as though she had to be rewarded for her adeptness with the language, but she ignored it.

"You mean to tell me you did know, all this time?"

He gave a slight shrug. " 'Course."

"And you were _fine_ with it? You had no objection to this being set up?"

"Alice, my dear, you are getting overheated. I _must_ warn you, jungle fever is a _constant_ danger on long sea voyages. And that's not even taking into account scurvy and the like---"

She stood, and he perforce stood, too.

"I thought you didn't want me to forget you! You were afraid that I would, if I came back to my world. You said---"

"I know what I said," he interrupted. "I may be mad, Alice, but I'm hardly forgetful. I did worry that you would forget me. But you haven't, you see, and young Mr. Carter is a guarantee---"

"He's no such thing."

"---a guarantee that you won't, you see."

"He's an _imitation_," she seethed, her irritation having grown out of proportion to the length of the argument. "Why should you send me an _imitation_? You're worse than my mother, expecting me to be married to Hamish Ascot simply because he's a Lord!"

"I'm nothing like your mother!" said the Hatter, clearly offended by the implication.

"It's exactly like my mother! Why on earth should you send someone who looks like you, who talks like you, but who clearly _isn't_ you---"

"On earth indeed, Alice," said the Hatter sharply, cutting across her words as cleanly as though with his sword. His eyes were darkening with the tell-tale signs of anger, his voice thickening as he spoke. "_You_ insisted on coming back to your world instead of staying in Underland like any sensible person would have done."

"But I'm not sensible!"

"I _know_ that!"

"And that's no excuse for trying to thrust me into a relationship with a fake."

"We were trying to be kind---"

"But I don't _want_ him!"

"What _do_ ye want?" he hissed, with the sort of anger he had shown so briefly before, long ago, when she told him she did not slay. "Actin' like a spoiled _child_, ye are, Alice. When we've done everything we could for ye, to thank ye for what ye did for us. The Queen chose so _carefully_."

She stood, and shook her head, feeling on the verge of tears--- a grown girl like her! And when she hadn't cried in so long!"It's not right. Whatever you do. It won't be right. I thought you, of all people, should understand that."

He seemed to be catching himself, taking deep breaths and coming back to his more usual self, losing the broad angry words of Outlandish. "We tried everything to set it up," he went on, the lisp slowly reappearing as the brogue became lost. "If you could only see what we did for you, Alice. If you only knew, only---"

This was too much for her.

"I thought the entire point of me going to Wonderland," she said angrily, "was to prove that I needn't do what people expect of me _just_ because they expect it. That I have the choice of what I do, and no one can force me into their own roles just by saying so."

She found, to her great embarrassment and distress, that her fists were clenched, tucked against the fabric of her frock; that she had stomped her foot _exactly_ like a spoiled child; that the Hatter, eyes paling back to their more usual shade, was looking downcast and chagrined, head drooping till the hat fell off it. It landed with curious soundlessness on the cabin floor, and was, more curiously, ignored.

"Only we _do_ so want you to be happy," he murmured, chin on his chest.

She could find nothing to say to this, only stood silent and watched him. When he moved at last, head still down, he did not disappear as she expected him to, but went to the door. There he stood with his back to her for a moment, before he straightened his shoulders and lifted his bare mussed head. It was with a faint smile apparent in his voice that he began, "Alice, have you any idea why---"

But she was still angry.

"_No_," she said.

He dropped his head again, and went through the open door without attempting to say anything further. The breeze from the open porthole, chilling Alice as it passed, slammed the door after him. She stood with her arms clutched about her for a moment, feeling such surges of emotion--- oh, regret, certainly, and the remnants of anger, at this world separating her from the Hatter, and at herself, and a powerful need--- that she fairly reeled under the onslaught. There was only one thing for it: chase after him, and hope he had not disappeared again.

She clutched at the door handle, flung it open. The familiar face presented itself to her, green eyes wide, the mouth startling into an O; and though she knew full well it was impossible, she believed it nevertheless, and reaching upwards caught his face in her hands.

"But I don't _want_ the figment," she said, "only the reality. I _am_ spoiled, you see."

Drew him downwards for a kiss, stretched upwards to meet him, met him plane for plane on this world, on all worlds, and all elbows and arms, wrapped herself around him. He clung to her in turn, real and solid--- _real. solid._--- beneath her hands; quite warm; quite open to possibilities.

She did not open her eyes till she had dropped away from him again; and saw what she had feared all along to see.

"I say," said Carter, and gulped. "All I meant to ask was if you fancied some tea."

"This," said Alice, "is _not_ going to work."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: So this is the end of this story. Thanks for reading!**

* * *

**Part Four**

The sight of land was a relief to Alice, far more than she had ever expected. The long time spent on the Wonder had strengthened her taste for adventure and cultivated in her a habit of walking nearly sideways to compensate for the roll of the ship; but beyond such things, she was pleased to find that China was waiting for her with eager, open arms.

She packed her things carefully, finding space for the hat and wrapping it up carefully so that it would not be crushed, and the charred and blackened bits would not be knocked off. The Hatter was sure to come back for it, at any rate, and she would have it for him when he arrived, in just the same condition as he had left it. She couldn't think how he had come to leave it behind; he must have been distracted indeed. But the memory of their last interview was painful still, and she dismissed it as quickly as she could.

She followed the man bearing her trunk on his shoulder, out of the cabin and onto the deck, moving inexorably towards the waiting gangplank. As much as she enjoyed the novelty of shipboard life, there was no doubt that a change would do her good.

As she passed along the deck, she caught a glimpse of auburn hair, of face strangely unburnt by the sun; and with her heart in her throat she turned towards it. But it was not the Hatter; it was the poor simulacrum, the blighted sailor, the over-eager Carter.

She really _had_ been quite cruel to him, she reflected. Since the unfortunate incident just outside her door, she had avoided him absolutely. Now, if any, was the time to make amends. Decided on her path, she strayed from the wake of the porter and moved towards Carter, who was hiding himself poorly behind a complicated knot of salt-encrusted ropes.

He came forth to greet her with an abashed look.

She put her hand out for him to shake.

"I owe you an apology, Mr. Carter. I suppose--- I suppose my actions must have been rather confusing."

"They were that," he said, the abashed look giving way to one of indescribable, insensible gratitude. He took her hand eagerly. "But I don't mind. I enjoyed your--- your company, Miss Kingsleigh."

"Perhaps, in the face of things, you might call me Alice." She accompanied this overture of friendship with a grave sort of smile; and the way his eyes widened and a dimple started at the corner of his mouth made her realize all over again what he was missing.

"_Alice_," he said; and she knew for a certainty.

"_Well_," she amended to herself, withdrawing her hand. "_Perhaps not._" But to Carter she only said, "My thanks for a pleasant voyage, Mr. Carter; and goodbye."

He said nothing, only bowed his red head deeply; and she made certain that, when he looked up, she was already gone.

* * *

Alice settled into her offices quite easily, and left her things to be unpacked for days. She was waiting; she was watching; she was hoping.

She was disappointed.

The Hatter did not make a reappearance, and neither, likewise, did the rest of Underland's citizens. Even Absolem refused to visit, foregoing the pleasure of insulting her. (She was quite sure he did find it a pleasure.) At long last she unloaded her trunk, finding spaces for her things, wondering if she should ever feel quite at home here.

_My father had a dream that stretched halfway across the globe---_

And a daughter, she added mentally, that traveled even further.

It put her in mind of something, though she could not quite recall what; so she shook her head, and took the hat from its resting place in the trunk, and found it a place to live in her bedroom.

* * *

It was in a dream that she remembered the fall.

Cascading down like a waterfall, her hair streaming behind her, and after the initial shock she felt no alarm, no concern as to what she would find at the bottom of the rabbit hole. There was only the falling, and the things she was surrounded with, falling with her, as nonsensical as any dream.

But it wasn't a dream.

And as the girl fell, she talked to herself, for her mother had been unable to break her of the habit.

"I wonder how many miles I've fallen by this time? I must be getting close to the center of the earth." she said; and a little while later, "I wonder what Latitude and Longitude I've got to?" And then again, a bit later, "I wonder if I shall fall right through the earth! How funny it'll seem to come out among the people who walk with their heads downwards! But I shall have to ask them what country this is, of course--- Australia, or New Zealand---"

The words were on Alice's lips when she awoke.

_"Or China."_

Why not, after all?

She went out early the next morning, and purchased a spade, just in case.

* * *

The rabbit hole was dusty; it had obviously not been used in some time. She poked at it experimentally with her shoe, to see if it was really there.

It was.

"Well," she said, for even now she never had been broken of the habit of talking to herself, "I said I had things to take care of. I've taken care of them, for the present. And I wouldn't have to stay long, if I didn't want to; I could always come back again, easily."

She had the oddest desire to hold her nose closed, as though she were plunging into deep water as she took the leap. But she didn't; left her hands free, let them flail and tangle in her streaming hair as above her the light got farther and farther away; and she fell deeper and deeper and deeper and _then_---

* * *

"Att-tt-tt-ack!" gibbered the March Hare, and flung himself under the table.

"What are you talking about?" Mallymkun planted two tiny paws on her hips and stared at where her friend had so recently been. There was nothing to be seen of him other than a furry, quivering rump with a bobbed tail. "We're not being attacked. It's _Alice_."

She had landed in a patch of flowers near the tea table, and was still picking leaves out of her hair even now, ten minutes later. Rather unsteadily, she smiled at the Hatter, who did nothing. He didn't appear able to move. As soon as she had taken a seat at the table, he had fixed his wide green eyes on her, developed a curious sort of twitch around the mouth, and set to staring as though his life depended on it.

"The real Alice," she said, and reached a hand out to take his. "No substitutions accepted. Oh, and, "she added, withdrawing the hand momentarily to join it with the other, "I brought you something."

The hat sat between them on the table, innocently. Slowly, the Hatter's drifted down to it; then, just as slowly, back up to Alice.

"The real Alice," he whispered, one eyebrow lifting.

Alice leaned forward to echo his whisper. "You're spoiled too, you see," she said quietly.

The Hare, meanwhile, had discovered the other object Alice had brought with her, and now popped back up above the table clutching it. "Shovel!" he screeched, brandishing it at Mallymkun.

"Call a spade a spade," said the Dormouse.

"Alright--- it's a spade!" He collapsed on the table, giggling, and she shook her head and took a sip from her tea cup.

"I _told_ you not to let him have any cake," she said, rounding on the Hatter, only to find that he had disappeared; along with, as it further turned out, Alice. Mallymkun stared around for a moment, searching, but wisely gave up rather quickly. She had bigger things to worry about, at the moment; for one, the Hare had roused himself and was advancing on her with the look in his eye that signified he was about to try and stuff her into a teapot again. Again.

She reached for her sword, just in case, and brandished it at him.

"Just you go on and try it, bucko," she said.

* * *

They were walking through the woods; the Hatter's step faltered, and he came to a stop.

"We'll get lost," he said.

Alice took a firmer grip on his hand.

"I don't mind," she told him.

But he was shaking his head, his heavy, hatted head, and his fingers in hers were curiously cold. "Because you've never been lost; not really lost, Alice. But I have. I've spent too much time being timeless not to know the difference. It's not like you can wind a clock and make everything go back to the way it was, you know."

"I don't want everything the way it was," she told him, and tugged gently on his hand. "I want them like this." He stood still, stoic, and would not budge. "Besides which," she added, "how can you possibly get lost? I know exactly where you are."

She slipped a hand under his chin and lifted it till he looked at her.

"Here," she told him, "with me."

His lips were cold at first; then not; then warm as hers; then warmer. His hands, too, stretching round her, reaching, grasping, holding, pulling, till they could be no closer. The sky darkened around them, the woods lowered, the grass rose up to meet them, and when he managed to pull away his hat was lost somewhere close by and he said, somewhat dazedly, "They'll be holding tea, you know."

"And you'll be holding me," said Alice, trying not to laugh. "Isn't that better? Or _different_, at least."

"Don't look down on tea," said the Hatter, almost savagely, and kissed her shoulder.

"Never," agreed Alice. "It all began with the tea, after all."

"Indeed," said the Hatter, "and _most_ things twinkled after that."

The stars in the Underland sky shone most improbably bright; and when morning came, more improbably still, they shone on. _I believe that_, thought Alice.

The hat lay a little ways away from them in the tall grass. Once, she had been of the size to crawl under it and sleep for a while. _I believe that_, thought Alice.

Mallymkun had managed to persuade the March Hare to dig himself in deep with the spade; he snoozed in the ground, only his head and ears showing. The Dormouse herself had set up a guard over him, in case a rocking-horsefly came and tried to settle on his nose, causing him unbearable itching. She slumbered near him, a steady friend, always at the ready to defend when someone needed defending. _I believe that, too_, thought Alice.

In the distance she could see the arch and spires of a castle, too far away to be comprehended, but there all the same. On the throne within, the Queen watched over her citizens and subjects, and waited for the day to come that absolute peace should be restored. _I believe that it will_, thought Alice.

Closer at hand, a breeze began to stir the ruined windmill that housed the Hatter and Hare. It spoke wordlessly of a change, of things taking a turn for the better. _I believe that it's coming_, thought Alice, and, further,_ and that I will be here to see it._

She had not slept much during the night, but she was rested; felt soft, mossy, as though the Underland had grown over her and accepted her as part and parcel. As belonging._ I believe--- _

"Breakfast," said the Hatter in her ear.


End file.
